About 400 patients will be shifted from the main building of the SSKM Hospital from December 15 as it will undergo a renovation. Director of medical education C.R. Maity said the heritage building will be renovated in phases. The 400 patients, out of a total of 700 admitted in the main building, will have to be shifted for the first phase of the renovation work. He said 100 patients will be relocated in different wings of the SSKM Hospital while the remaining 300 will be transferred to the four medical colleges in the city. Maity held a meeting with the principals of the medical colleges during the day on the relocation of patients. It was decided that neurology and neurosurgery patients would be shifted to Calcutta National Medical College and RG Kar Medical College, while the cases of plastic surgery will go to Nilratan Sirkar and Calcutta Medical College and Hospital. Maity said all medical colleges had departments of orthopaedics and general medicine and the patients admitted to these wings will be equally distributed among all four medical colleges. The operation theatres will be temporarily shifted to the top floor of the main building.

The state government on Wednesday indicated that it may not accept all the recommendations of the A.R. Kidwai committee, which recently submitted its report to the government on madarsa education reforms. Releasing a special issue of Siksha Darpan, a journal published by the West Bengal Board of Madarsa Education, state school education minister Kanti Biswas said his government was examining the A.R. Kidwai committee report. “We cannot accept every recommendation,” said Biswas, refusing to specify the exact areas which could be rejected by his government. Biswas said his government has decided to include all recognised madarsas in the state under the Central government-sponsored Sarbasiksha Avijan scheme. The project aims at ensuring compulsory elementary education for all children between six and 14 years within 2010.

The city police on Wednesday arrested Narayan Saha on charges of depositing a forged passport with his visa application at the US consulate. Deputy commissioner of police, security control, P.K. Chatterjee said investigations had revealed that the passport deposited by Saha was in the name of one Nandini Ghosh of Cossipore. “We checked up the number of the deposited passport with the Regional Passport Office. There is no Nandini Ghosh,’’ he said. US consulate officials told the cops that Saha was supposed to appear for his visa interview at the consulate office on Wednesday. “We have taken him in custody,’’ Chatterjee said.

The Howrah Municipal Corporation (HMC) and the police demolished 17 illegal apartments on Sanatan Mistry Lane on Wednesday morning, prompting the occupants to ransack promoter Gopal Sau’s house. Howrah superintendent of police Rajesh Kumar said the flat-owners had bought the house from Sau at a high price. But HMC records later revealed that the flats had been constructed illegally.

Nearly 187 employees of the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation, West Bengal, and Regional Provident Fund Cooperative Credit Society Ltd, West Bengal, donated blood at a camp held on Wednesday at DK Block in Salt Lake. A monk from the Ramakrishna Mission Math (Belur) inaugurated the camp. Also present was mayor Subrata Mukherjee. Speakers at the camp held forth on the role of the provident fund organisations in the field of social security.

The School Service Examinations will be held on March 16, 2003, according to Arun Kiran Chakraborty, chairman of the West Bengal School Service Commission. The last date for submission of applications is December 14.

Plying of all vehicular traffic will remain suspended along the stretch of AJC Bose Road between Rabindra Sadan and Calcutta Club indefinitely from December 4 due to the construction of a flyover in the area.